Day 300: Hands of Public Service in Trump's America

I thought I knew what I was going to write today to commemorate this, the 300th day of being in mandated medical quarantine. The struggles, hardships, landmarks, and breakthrough. The mandates, updates orders, and ever-shifting protocols we do our best to follow even when we have not been able to see a finish line. I thought I knew how I was going to describe my pride for my husband's strength to stand by me, my own resilience to stand by the letter of the law to protect me. I thought about so much. What this horrible solitude does to a person.

What it does to this person.

Scrapped after one day living in Trump's America in the wake of the siege of the capitol building.

I am a public servant serving the people of Ohio through the state health department in several roles. I rise early and go to bed late almost every day. I start before other teams are on and operational. I am used to overtime being the expectation rather than the exception to the rule. I take the mandatory lunch break as my other team members do, and work the whole way through as my colleagues do because...because we are here to serve and that is the only way to even start to make a dent in this work as we fight off the COVID-19 virus and the devastation it is currently wreaking on the Midwest. Recently, we have started to turn the most dangerous tide yet away from our borders and loved ones.

I never expected to do anything but be the most unpopular telemarketer I have ever met. I did not expect covert teams. I did not expect to be selected for the honor and privilege of serving in the roles that I do--in the field, in training others for readiness in the field, in policy-information, and more.

I hold the confidence of the state. I hold the data of our country. I hold the tears of my cases and their families. I hold the hands of my co-workers as our fingertips brush our computer screens. And always, I hold my integrity with every action, every word, and every decision I render.

I never chose that path; I shied from it. But now in this time of crisis when I asked "Who?" I finally heard an echo as a resounding call to help. A devotion to protect members of our species during uncertain and unprecedented times.

As a part of the strike team, I move in and out of counties unable to support the people buckling under the weight this disease has dumped on the scales of hospitals, retail businesses, and families who have lost a loved one. Who we have lost along the way. I hear you, I see you, I serve you.

Today I had to make some tough decisions that involved the imminent physical safety of two cases, two citizens, two people who I was just fortunate enough to randomly connect with at the right moment. Then the safety of officers and first responders. It could have been any member on our team working in that jurisdiction today. But it was me. Not my first time, nor last time, with de-escalating a situation wildly, recklessly out of hand. However this was the first time between two actively armed people I have encountered while furiously typing one-handed to arrange with my supervisor and team to get the right people to the actual scene in time. To speak one set of words into one phone, a set of directions into another, and type a third set into a moving text-box on my computer screen. To speak in a calm voice that I have been reviewed and debriefed on and I hear no tremor despite the fear I that was so palpably feeling in that moment. The soft, firm tone convincing both people to stay on the phone knowing one (or multiple) death/s was just one wrong word, one inflection, away from being a permanent part of my conscience for the rest of my life. The moment I hear the conviction that lead to the slow ease of the muscles holding weapons and words in check just long enough for reason to gradually enter what became a conversation.

I credit my team for quick thinking suggestions and dropping their current calls to help me get to the authorities I needed while staying on the phone to breathe that calm temperance into a seemingly unstoppable usurping of a person's basic right to live without being beaten or worse. As hard and terrifying as that 2 1/2 hour situation was...the immediacy of calling on skills from education in days past and intuition that manifested from mind to mouth in microseconds; it is not that moment that grabs my attention as I sit here by myself reflecting on the day. On the fact both people are alive and safe tonight. Angry, yes. Unsatisfied, most definitely. And alive, with certainty.

But no, this is not what is wearing out the tread and my mind races around my quiet living room tonight.

Sandwiched on either side of calling first responders and gate-keeping guardians to help me help these desperate and angry people were the calls I made for 13+ hours today before stumbling, tripping...confused and heart-aching, into the shower. Thank God I waited that long to stumble.

In the aftermath of yesterday's despicable display at the nation's sacred capitol, my team and I witnessed the anger, the fear, and the empowerment of cruel ideals take root in the thoughts and words of citizens in our state. During routine calls I make every day to check on people diagnosed with COVID-19, I had more people refuse to speak with me than I have had in the whole six months I have been doing this because, succinctly said by my second call today, I am perceived as "just the b---ch who probably invented the whole f---ing hoax, ain't ya?"

"No, sir, I am calling about some test results with guidance and to answer any questio-"

"F---ing b---h, f--k off, got it?"

Click.

I was called the c-word by no fewer than three men today, all three times my age. Two more in a younger age bracket went a step further if that is possible. A man I spoke to in the afternoon only listened to my greeting of "Hello?...hello-" before beginning a tirade with that word and proceeding that I am a " f---ing L--tard who f---cked up [his] life and everything good about this country."

I have never met this man.

He did not pause before spitting through phone, "I will find you--all of you and I am coming for you. Don't you call my back you [redacted] or I will blow your head off."

Click.

I felt my soul unravel at the seams as the cloth of who I am was stripped from my body by strangers I am trying my best to help and desecrated with these baseless, beastly accusations and threats.

"Hello, am I speaking with ____?"

"Who the f--ck is this?"

"My name is-"

"I don't give two s--ts about who you are. Leave me f--k alone you f---ing a--hole."

Click.

I am staring at my hands. The hands I use for charting, taking down information about sick family members, the fingers that find the files of resources to help struggling communities. The hands which today, failed to protect me from reaching out to hands slapping me away, that caught glancing blows from thrown up middle fingers at the offer of help.

The hands that are preparing my files for tomorrow. The fingers that are gliding over keys to rewrite how I present myself to practice for at least 30 minutes before my head hits the pillow so I can sound more approachable tomorrow. The hands that will once again reach out first thing in the morning for any hand I see and continuing to search for those who are reaching back.

I am here for you. I am here to help you.

But first I feel these hands massaging my pounding temples. My fingers reaching up to wipe away the tears sliding down my face when no one can see or hear the sadness pouring out of my body. My hands gently combing my dog's warm, furry coat that helps reknit the parts of my soul that I could feel flapping in the wind. Darning the words of damnation out of my heart one snuggle at a time.

The hands that just wrote a cost comparison the get this vaccine to as many people as possible. The hands that cradle a phone when I am the only call into a negative-pressure room and I spend more than an hour with cases talking about what they see from their window. the hands that still gesture as I talk excitedly to parents as their children turn the corner from an illness that could have shifted the setting at the family dining table forever. The hands that write "case closed" for good or bad as I walk this road with so many.

The hands that will be up and ready first thing tomorrow to gladly protect and serve you.

Yes, please physically distance. But reach back and I will hold you, too. I promise.

Prepare, don't panic,

-Allison